


Bright-Eyed

by cricket_aria



Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Squall's Attempts At Emotional Growth, time compression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-11
Updated: 2019-05-11
Packaged: 2020-02-29 20:32:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18785677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cricket_aria/pseuds/cricket_aria
Summary: Squall wakes up freed from the time compressed world.





	Bright-Eyed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kameiko](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kameiko/gifts).



After the endless stretch of gray that he’d been wandering so long that time had lost all meaning, if it had even existed within the void to begin with, the light was dazzling. It reached him even through his closed eyelids, pushing its way into his brain and finding his mind where it had retreated deep into himself, pulling further and further away from the dead world he was trapped in until he didn’t know that he’d have ever found his way back to consciousness again on his own. Whatever faint shreds of awareness he’d had left before even they’d faded had accepted it as a fitting end; if he’d failed to drag his body back into the real world without being a decade out of time than why shouldn’t his mind eventually fail to drag itself back up to where it was forced to look out at how badly he’d lost himself?

He had to squeeze his eyes shut again almost immediately after his first try at opening them, the light too bright to stand after the dim nothingness they’d become used to, but when the stinging went away he tried again with the sense to only start with a crack that time. When the light-blindness faded he finally realized just what he was looking up at: Rinoa in their field of flowers, staring down at him as if he really had just woken up from death itself. “Sorry,” he said, his voice weak and raspy. How long had it even been since he’d last talked? He could have been in that void for a week, or a month, or a year for all the difference time had made, never hungering or tiring apart from the eventual bone-deep weariness over nothing ever changing, not even a shift between day or night to help him keep track of the passage of time. “I got lost on the way back.”

She laughed, or maybe sobbed, the choked sound could have been either and the way her expression twisted as he talked didn’t give him any clues. Then the hand she had resting on his chest lifted just long enough to smack back down sharply on the same spot. “As soon as we get everyone back together again we are going to have a giant party just to celebrate how much everyone _loves you,_ until it finally sticks hard enough that you can find a place _you want to be_ if this ever happens again, do you hear me?”

He suddenly realized there were tears in her eyes in spite of her mouth’s best attempt to smile. “Rinoa,” he said in sudden panic, panic that by getting trapped in time he’d managed to push her away like he had so many other people whether he wanted to or not. “Rinoa, I came _here_. Matron can tell you, I came, like I promised, but the time was wrong,” he reached up, trying to swipe away the tears before they could fall. “I had to go back into the compressed world. I couldn’t get out a second time.”

She was silent for long enough that the worry only grew before gently touching his cheek with a more honest-sounding laugh, “They did say we only had a short time to get back. We promised at the wrong place, didn’t we?”

“Wrong?” he echoed. He couldn’t imagine a place more right for her than within the beautiful field.

“The wrong place when dealing with Time Compression! We should have picked somewhere that wasn’t already special to you before.” Her fingers drifted up, pressing into his hair, and he found himself relaxing. “But we couldn’t have known that, right?”

“That’s right, but…” he covered her hand with his, feeling it was important make sure she understood, “…I wanted to be where you were. I never forgot, I promise.”

“It’s okay, Squall. We’ll just remember to promise again next time. Except hopefully there won’t be actually be one.” Then she curled her fingers under his shoulders, urging him to sit, “Now up, up, Irvine’s waiting back with Edea, and he’s probably getting his own ideas about what’s taking us so long.”

Squall let her bustle him to his feet. “He came here too?”

“Where else would he be? Have you ever heard him talk about anywhere else that would be special to him?”

“No, but I didn’t know he meant it was that important. He lived longer in his Garden.”

She rolled her eyes fondly at him, “And has he ever talked about it the same way? Living somewhere a long time doesn’t automatically make it the most special place to you, silly, otherwise I’d be back in my father’s house right now.” Her hand found his, holding tight. “What about the others? Where do you think they are?”

He shrugged, “Back home?”

“No, Squall! Think seriously! These are your friends, you know them. Where would they be?” She squeezed his hand gently, “I know you’re trying to do better with people. This is part of that. Understanding them from the things they told you.”

He frowned, staring up at the blue sky-still so incredible after the endless gray clouds-and hesitantly said, “Back home… for Zell. He’s the only one of us with a parent, he’d want to go back to her.” Rinoa hummed her agreement, but didn’t break in to offer her own thoughts as he kept mulling it over. “Selphie is at Trabia Garden. Maybe… she might have ended up a few months in the past, before the missiles. When she might have been able to save more from getting destroyed. And… if Sis was caught up in it she’s in Winhill. All the time she was pulling us into the past she was always trying to get back there.”

“You skipped someone, Squall,” Rinoa told him softly.

“I know. I know, but I…” his tongue seemed to twist around the words he wanted to say, unable to feel out how to get them out right. “I never… I couldn’t understand her the way she wanted. The only thing I can think of is that there’s a place she took me once. Somewhere she felt comfortable enough to talk to me, once. But I don’t know if she’d still feel comfortable there, after how that went.”

“Okay, we’ll find them all. And when we find Quistis, whether she ended up where you’re thinking or not, here’s the next thing you can do to try to get better at friendship: whatever it is you said to her that you obviously know you shouldn’t have, you say that you’re sorry for it. Do you think you can do that?”

“If you’re with me to help get the words out? I think I can do anything.”

He’d been given a new chance at life in a bright and beautiful world. He would try to do things better this time.


End file.
